The day had not been the way I had expected to be. Purvottar Sampark Kranti was late by little over thirty hours and my parents missed the annual function of ICAI at Delhi. In their absence the Award Function did not seem exciting to me as it was in 2007. I could just meet Mom and Dad for about fifteen minutes and had to rush to the airport.
I had to board from T3 and the structure was Majestic. I would have enjoyed being there had it been any other normal day but the way things turned out during the day, I was in no mood to appreciate the appreciable. The flight was delayed by thirty minutes as the incoming flight arrived late (as usual).
Some angry passengers took on the staff out there complaining how Kingfisher flights are always delayed. The anger could be understood as it was already 11:30 at night . Some going to extent complaining that KF had huge debt in its books which it never repay (meaning KF flights are late because it has huge debts in its books).. At about quarter to twelve, the boarding gates were opened and by about quarter past midnight, the flight was taxied to the runway. I had planned half day with my parents but could be with them for only fifteen minutes. Was really upset over this.
After moving around for about 15-20 mins, the flight was ready for take off. Lights went off and seat belts on. The plane gathered decent speed. To my understanding the front wheels had left the ground when the flight was grounded with a screeching sound and a thud (akin to the sound of a car braking at high speed). The flight came to a standstill in seconds. I almost hit the seat ahead . My heart was beating like hell and for a second I felt we are gone. The caption told us that there was a technical snag and asked us not to panic. Murmuring Hanuman Chalisa, I was just praying for things to be normal.
We returned back to the boarding gate and it was chaos all around. Some passengers took on the air hostess and few started banging the cockpit door (as if a bus has hit a pedestrian and the public wants to take the driver to task). Everyone was tensed but the way these few behaved was, I feel uncalled for. Arguing with the Airhostess who have no clue about what has happened was pointless. The pilot did what best he could have done in the circumstances and we were safe. Arguing, rather fighting with the pilot as to why he grounded the plane would have been of no avail. We are not experts in flying a plane!!!
Some started suggesting all to ask for a Five Star accommodation. These people didn’t even believe that we could fly back to Mumbai safely. I must appreciate Kingfisher
Airlines for their effort to arrange an alternate flight in just over an hour. The groundstaff did wonderfully to shift entire baggage to this alternate flight in such a short span of time. We were also put on this plane in no time. I was happy that we would be flying soon.
Well there was still some action remaining. Those few rebels who almost broke into the pilot’s cabin held the pilot and did not want him to fly the alternate plane. Though these few did not want to fly back, I could not understand why they did not want the pilot to fly. I don’t think they were so concern about the public. I feel they just wanted to be right in arguing with the pilot and proving the pilot wrong. Otherwise there was no merit in arguing with the pilot. The fact that the plane was grounded was a past about which nothing much could be done. Instead of looking ahead they just held everyone up for another hour.
The pilot somehow with the help of security guard managed to reach the new flight and was ready to fly us back. In the meanwhile I fell asleep. It was about four and a half now. I woke up to the noises of few passengers. Seemed like someone is giving a political speech. I woke up just to find those few rebels trying to convince the passengers not to fly back and that we were making a grave mistake in choosing to continue the journey. No support to the rebels this time from any passengers and finally we were ready to take off.
The flight took off safely with a huge round of applause and soon we were served dinner at about 5:30 am in the morning. I slept for an hour and landed in Mumbai safely….
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